Expression of Interest: Customer Contact Centres

UKAS is considering running a project to develop accreditation for the certification to ISO 18295-1:2017 Customer contact centres, Part 1: Requirements for customer contact centres.

As this activity represents an new area of accreditation, UKAS needs to undertake a development project to confirm the applicability of the proposed conformity assessment and establish a robust and proportionate assessment approach. UKAS would like to invite conformity assessment bodies that are interested in this certification to express their interest.

The decision to progress accreditation against either ISO/IEC 17021 or ISO/IEC 17065 will be determined as part of the project.

Please could you register your interest in this activity to UKAS ([email protected]) by 30 September 2024. It would also be helpful in the planning if you could provide the following information:

• Name of Organisation
• Confirm whether your interest is in assisting with the development of the assessment/or as a potential pilot project applicant
• Status of any current accreditation
• Scope of ISO 18295-1 assessment activities currently undertaken and for which accreditation is sought.

Organisations that submit an expression of interest will be invited to attend the meeting of interested parties where the terms of the project will be discussed along with a proposed timeline for key stages and any phased approach process that is deemed necessary. Following this meeting conformity assessment bodies will be required to submit a formal application to UKAS for the scope of accreditation sought and an agreement to the terms and conditions of the pilot programme before their participation is confirmed. There will be an opportunity to ask any scope specific questions on the details of the pilot programme at this stage.

Please note that if a development project was established a pilot programme will be required whereby there would be a development fee associated with participation in addition to the normal assessment fees.

UKAS is currently gauging the potential level of interest in this area so would also like to hear from technical experts that may wish to support UKAS as a stakeholder to provide expertise and support to the development of accreditation criteria and process.

Please note that submitting an expression of interest does not indicate any commitment to participate in the project on the part of the interested parties and nor does the acceptance of an expression of interest commit UKAS to accept the interested party on any future pilot project.